Can Cat5e/Cat6 run in Conduit with Electrical Wires ?

AP514

AP514

Getting comfortable
Dec 10, 2018
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Pearland, Texas
Can Cat5e/Cat6 run in Conduit with Electrical Wires ?
I have 2 options for running my cables to the Detached garage.
1) Run with the 100 AMP wires in conduit to garage(last resort)
2) with some 120 wires that go to garage in conduit that run the Garage door (best option)

Option 2 still only gets me half way there due to fact it only runs up to the door switch in the house. I would have to fish the rest of the way up into attic thru 8 inches of solid insulation.
I have blown in paper insulation that was shot in wet and dries simi-hard.

I want to run from a 8 port Switch in the garage to another in the house..

Anyone have other options I might do ? as in maybe use some shield Cat if there is such a thing....

Thanks in advance
AP514
 
No. No. No. Never ever run low voltage (coaxial, alarm cable, cat5/6, etc) inside same conduit or box as electrical. Unless you are into creating gravimetric wormholes or enjoy lightning strikes.
Is a ubiquiti point to point wireless bridge an option? Can run underground cat6 cable along shallow ( preferred is deep trench but sometimes not possible) trench back and forth?
 
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No option there for trenching..Have 40 foot of concrete between.
 
Aerial? I have seen it done correctly as an option
 
Try Powerline, some members have reported good enough results ( depends on equipment iirc .. )
 
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Those are the options I want to use. the 2 option only has garage security lights in conduit and they are rarely used. I might just pull them. but the conduit still comes into the Breaker box
 
being just data cable.. you could empty out that conduit and then cut it/remove it from breaker box. Penetrate at 90 degrees right there.
Or try "Powerline". Dunno anything about it but sounds like viable option too.
 
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do not want to go WIFI.....
 
Then sounds like best option is to run a underground cat6 cable feed back and forth through the empty conduit. Underground cat6 cable is waterproof. No need to be shielded
 
Something else to consider. I actually don't know if it's okay to run cat6 along with 12 volt DC or 24 volt DC cable. Would take a bit of research. but you could convert your garage 110 volt security lights over to DC
 
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AP514 said:
Can Cat5e/Cat6 run in Conduit with Electrical Wires ?
I have 2 options for running my cables to the Detached garage.
1) Run with the 100 AMP wires in conduit to garage(last resort)
2) with some 120 wires that go to garage in conduit that run the Garage door (best option)

Option 2 still only gets me half way there due to fact it only runs up to the door switch in the house. I would have to fish the rest of the way up into attic thru 8 inches of solid insulation.
I have blown in paper insulation that was shot in wet and dries simi-hard.

I want to run from a 8 port Switch in the garage to another in the house..

Anyone have other options I might do ? as in maybe use some shield Cat if there is such a thing....

Thanks in advance
AP514
Click to expand...
Is the garage door circuit fed from the house and not the garage? If the circuit is coming from the house can you re feed it from the 100 amp garage circuit (which I’m guessing is a panel feed.)

If you can do that now you have a spare conduit that you can run whatever in.

As a side note it is generally acceptable in the NEC to run class 2 circuits (24v etc) with communication wires. If you don’t know what class 2 circuits are just look at the transformer, it should have it listed on it.

Also any conduit that leaves the interior of any building is then considered a wet location. Under a slab, outside of the building etc.The wire should be listed for use in wet locations. Most wire will have its many listings on it, THHN,THWN, MTW etc. The THWN or THWN 2 is your wet location listing. Romex does not have that listing. The cat 6 should have that listing as well.

If you do just run regular cat6 at least get riser cable which should be labeled CMR. It is tougher and cheaper than plenum cable (CMP) and plenum rating isn’t generally needed in residential.
 
Yes, the light switches are a 3 way switch powered from the Garage(not 100% on that)
 
I have ran CAT 6 cables with 480V A/C, to use with Bosch POE HD PTZ cameras, with no problems , but the CAT6 cable was tray rated, and heavily shielded. You would need some good shielded cable, along with the shielded drain wire to be terminated with a proper shield connector on 1 end, to remove any induction, picked up from the A/C. Grounding both ends of the shielded connectorized cable creates an antenna, watch out for that, you will just want to ground the shield on 1 side of the cable
 
I will have no problems finding a ground seeing my house and Garage are Steel Frame.
 
Do like Google fiber and diamond saw a groove into the cement?
Then again, Google fiber had some issues with that cable laying method.
 
I use powerline adapters to get Ethernet to my garage outbuilding about 100ft from the house. I never measured speed but it’s fast enough to stream TiVo on the LAN and use the web at the same time with no issues.

I have empty conduit and decided to give them a try. Plug in one adapter near your router and another in the garage. Setup was 5 mins maybe. This is the model I used: TP-Link AV2000 Gigabit Powerline Ethernet Adapter. $80 job done. I didn’t need any cable or the hassle of sending a wire through. I’d try that first.
 
I'm using TP-Link AV2000 TL-PA9020P adapters to connect my Blue Iris server plus my NAS to my router through the powerline. The adapter is reporting a connection speed of over 800Mbps. My ISP provides 120Mbps so the adapters are more than adequate.

You may try your existing power lines running through the conduit to connect the adapters. If the connection speed isn't great you can run a decldicated powerline between the two points as the existing power lines may have too much noise on them due to motors or LED tubes, etc. This way you don't have Cat 6 running long distance parallel to the power lines. Even when you cross over powerline the Cat 6 should be kept a miminum of 12" away to avoid induced crosstalk noise.
 
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